Bright's Light (16 page)

When the cart crested the low rise, Bright spotted the dark gap between the membrane wall and the roof of the Store, revealing the permanent citynight that lay over the districts. She was looking forward to getting into more flattering lighting. There was a limit to how much sallowness one favour could take.

Fon hummed happily inside the parachute bag. At least
she’s
enjoying herself, thought Bright, sourly.

In the distance, Bright saw two tour buses lined up at the gate and tiny black figures arrayed around them.

She brought the cart to a stop. She had a strong feeling that they shouldn’t drive out one person short. Plus, the PS officer from It had said they should avoid other PS officers until everything was straightened out. She’d forgotten that little detail when she headed off on her mission to rescue Pinkie and Peaches. Doing things she thought up herself was really hard.

The cart sounded like a sack of old metal scraps tumbling down a flight of stairs when it was in motion, and still Fon had to ask: “Are we moving?”

“Just waiting our turn,” said Bright. They were far enough away that she hoped the officers at the gate couldn’t see them. Just in case, she dimmed all the lights on the cart, including the headlights.

Danger seemed to drift around the gate area the same way mind alter mix wafted around a fun pipe with a cheap mouthpiece. Bright backed up the cart until the gate was no longer visible. Then she began driving in a series of slow, noisy circles.
Click, thump, bang. Click, thump, bang. Grind.
Around and around they went. Fon hummed to herself, perfectly content. Bright experimented with how tight she could make the cart’s turning radius while she waited for a solution to come to her.

Was there some way to climb over the membrane between the Natural Experience and the Mind Alter District? She doubted anyone had ever tried, since few people wanted to get into the Natural Experience and anyone leaving would just use the gate. Plus, the barrier was too high.

She turned the cart in circles and listened to the battered tires scrape against the wheel wells. The sky above, faintly visible through the yellow tint, had begun to darken. Bright’s spirits rose as the outside light departed. Suddenly, she slapped the dashboard. She had an idea!

She straightened the wheel and the cart bumped off to the left of the path. Twice in one day she was heading off-road! Bright could hardly believe her own daring. She made sure to stay on the far side of the rise and out of sight of the gate. She was going to take the cart under the membrane. Or through it, if she had to. Her motto was “No bot left behind.”

“Are we—?”

“Yup. Nearly there,” said Bright. It was warm in the Natural Experience, and the few living things sprouting here and there gave off colourful smells. As they drove, the translucent ceiling above them gradually turned blacker than the skin above the districts ever got, because here there were no artificial lights. Bright turned the headlights back on.

The membrane seemed to dampen any noise from the other side.

Bright stopped, got out of the cart, leaving the headlights on so she could see, and slowly approached the towering barrier. Warm sand gave way under her feet. Bright lifted her right foot and toed the rubbery membrane. There was the slightest give in the material, but it was stronger and thicker than she’d imagined.

She’d thought that she could simply dig a hole underneath the membrane that was big enough to drive the cart through, but when she got to her hands and knees and scraped the sand away from the base, she began to have doubts. She dug deeper. The sand under the first inch or so was cooler to the touch. When she’d dug a hole half a foot deep, her fingers felt something hard. Concrete had been poured around the base of the membrane.

She sat up, dismayed, and pushed both hands against the wall. It seemed to push back. She poked it with the last of her long fingernails. The nail bent, and she quickly took her hand away. Her manicure had been brutalized enough.

Bright looked back at her battered cart and her hooded dressing-mate sitting inside. Maybe she could use the vehicle
to ram through the wall. There was only one way to find out. With stiff knees, she got to her feet, ready to give it a try.

“Please tell me you aren’t going to try and drive through it,” said a male voice.

Bright clapped a hand to her mouth to stop herself from screaming.

A PS officer, nearly invisible in his black clothes, appeared beside the cart.

“I don’t think this is necessary any longer.” He reached over and pulled the parachute bag from Fon’s head. It caught on her halo as it came off, and Fon squeaked in alarm.

Bright tensed and got ready to run. If he asked whether they were from the third shift at the House of Gear, she was going to make a break for it. She had a feeling she wouldn’t get very far.

“It’s me,” he said. “Grassly.”

Bright remained perfectly still. Grassly? What kind of a name was that?

“I’m sorry. I didn’t introduce myself before, so I suppose you don’t know my name. I’m your representative from the House of It.”

Bright needed to see him better. Because he stood beside the cart, behind the range of the headlights, she couldn’t see his face. She remembered the light on her head and reached up to turn it on.

“No!” he yelled, startling her. In a quieter voice, he continued, “The light hurts my eyes. Just trust me when I say that I’m here to help.”

“What’s going on?” asked Fon. “I don’t understand
what’s happening. I never understand what’s happening anymore!”

The PS officer ignored Fon. He seemed to be considering the membrane. He looked the featureless black expanse up and down.

“Where are you going?” he asked.

Bright considered the question, trying to think up an answer that wouldn’t interfere with her promotion.

“She’s going to get her bot,” said Fon. “She’s a bot lover.”

“That’s not true,” protested Bright. “I just thought I would be more … productive at the House of It if I had my bot.”

“You’re a bot lover,” repeated Fon. Then she gave a dramatic shudder of distaste.

The PS officer did an amazing thing. He took off his dataglasses and walked toward Bright. Now that he was in the cart’s light and closer to Bright, she could see his eyes. They were very large and had a nice quality to them that she couldn’t quite put her finger on.

“There’s something you need to know,” said Grassly. “About what’s going on here.”

“Hello!” interrupted Fon. “We know what’s going on. The House of It has a new location and it wants us! We’re totally making it happen by acing every test. When we get promoted to the House of It, we will ROCK THAT PLACE!” She gave a loud whoop and held her hands up for someone, anyone, to smack in agreement.

Bright didn’t move. She stared into Grassly’s unexpectedly attractive eyes, waiting for his explanation.

“Sure,” he said. “That’s right. You’re doing great. Both of you. The House of It is impressed.”

“I knew it!” cried Fon.

Grassly slid his dataglasses back onto his face. His hand went to his temple and he wiggled his fingers, his head locked in place. He made a distressed noise and began to speak in a rush, the words practically bumping into one another in their hurry to get out of his mouth.

“Soon the lights will go out in every zone. The Store will be dark. At that time, I need you to go to the Headquarters and find a large switchboard. Flip switches until the lights come back on. Can you do that?”

Bright’s eyes widened. Was he crazy? No one went into the Headquarters, where the Deciders decided stuff. It was unheard of. No one had seen anyone from the Board of Deciders for a long time, and that was just fine by everyone. Why were people putting so many demands on her? Things were so much better when she just had to be an incredibly fun person with amazing style.

“I don’t think—”

“It’s time you started thinking,” said the PS officer who called himself Grassly.

Bright felt her tiny nostrils flare. “That,” she said stiffly, “is not in my job description.”

“She’s right,” said Fon. “It’s not in our contract. Or, like, our skill set or whatever.”

The officer turned his head to look at Fon. “Would you mind waiting in the cart?”

“Sure,” said Fon, agreeably. “How long should I wait?”

“I’ll let you know,” said Grassly.

Grassly led Bright away. They stood close to the rubberized membrane. A small, crescent-shaped light had appeared overhead, barely visible through the ceiling skin. It made her shiver.

“Bright,” said Grassly, “First of all, I’m not really from the House of It.”

She’d had a feeling he was going to say that. “Oh,” she said.

“And there’s something you should know about your contract.”

“Yes?”

“Releasing is not what you think.”

A pain pierced her side under her left arm, like she’d been jabbed. “What do you mean?” she asked.

“When you are released from your contract—”

“We come back better than ever,” she interrupted. “And it’s awesome. Even though it’s obviously not fun, like, at the time.”

“Bright?” Grassly’s voice was quiet. “When you are released from your contract, you die.”

So soft, his words. Like a kiss. Not that she’d ever felt a kiss. But they looked soft in the videos of the olden days that were used to demonstrate the dangers of unproductive attachments.

“We just go away for a while,” she insisted. She could hear the desperation in her voice. “Then we come back, better than ever. We’ve negotiated an excellent contract for ourselves.”

“I’m sorry, Bright,” Grassly said. “When you are released, you die. You do not come back. No one does.”

Bright nearly tripped over her own feet. A thousand questions tumbled around her brain. The pain under her arm was worse. “It’s not true,” she whispered. She’d seen hundreds of people released from their contracts. It was an essential part of corporate life. Of commerce! No one liked the idea of being released, but it was better than dying accidentally, like one of the sad, lumpy people in the warning displays of the Natural Experience.

“You are the only one in the Store who knows,” Grassly said. “But right now you’re all in danger of being released from your contracts. Forever. I want to save you. I want to save all of you. I have a ship, and I will take you all away and give you a fresh start somewhere new. But I need your help.”

Bright struggled to keep up. “What are you talking about? What do you mean you have a ship?”

“We’ll get to that later,” Grassly said.

“What about our promotions to It?”

He shook his head as though it weighed a thousand pounds. “This was never about the House of It. I just said that to get you to help me.”

“You lied?” she said, aware that she sounded like Fon. “But … the helmet? It’s not from the House of It?”

Grassly shook his head. “I made it,” he said. “And when you turn the lights back on, all the lights will be like the one on the helmet.”

It took a moment for the meaning of his words to sink in.

“So everyone will be like Slater. And my client. Why?”

“I don’t have time to explain everything that’s happening,” he said. “There have been unintended consequences from the lights. From my efforts to help. And now we need to move quickly. Everyone in the Store is in danger. Please, just trust me.”

This was too much.

“Trust you?” she said. “Even though your ‘unintended consequences’ are the reason everything is going crazy? And now you’re changing all the lights in the Store? I don’t understand anything anymore, and your directions don’t make any sense! This is all outside my training modules, and I think you should know that I’m feeling very upset right now! Why should I trust you?”

“Because I am trying to help you.”

“Why?” asked Bright. “We were fine. We were having fun!”

“You’re just going to have to trust me,” he repeated. “When the lights go out, I need you to go to the Headquarters and turn them on. Then come straight back here to the Natural Experience. Turn left at the skinny tree. Just like you did today. Go to the round doorway. I will save as many of you as I can. That’s all I have time to explain.”

Before Bright could tell him that she didn’t trust him, not one bit, Fon’s voice seemed to come out of nowhere.

“I thought I heard you guys call me,” Fon said. “So, the House of It wants us to turn the lights on?”

Fon must not have heard most of what Grassly said, because she sounded just like she always did.

“That’s right,” Grassly said, as though his conversation with Bright never happened. “This is all part of the testing process. Once you have turned the lights back on, head back to the Natural Experience and it will be time for your promotion.”

Fon was nodding. “I knew it.”

Grassly turned his head to assess the membrane. “You are right to avoid the gate. But how do you propose to get the cart through the skin?”

Bright didn’t reply. She was never going to speak to him again, in case he said more upsetting things.

“I have a tool,” said Fon. “It’s got a blade and scissors. I use it to rewire my halo when it gets a short. I keep it with me all the time.”

Bright stared at her dressing-mate, who had turned on her halo so she twinkled like a sparse galaxy.

“Yeah, it’s a pretty awesome tool. But it’s really sharp, so don’t cut yourself.” Fon lifted a long tan leg and slid the tool from a strap on her thigh.

“Oh my job,” muttered Bright.

“Here you go.” Fon waved the tool in the air.

Grassly had begun to look over his shoulder, as though he was late for an appointment. “Be careful in the Partytainment District,” he said. “It would be best to avoid it completely. I’m counting on you to turn the lights back on. It’s critically important.”

The pink twinklers on Fon’s halo were reflected in Grassly’s dataglasses, turning his eyes into stars.

“On your way to the Headquarters, try to avoid all other PS staff. Also, it might be a good idea to change.”

“You mean like our outfits? We were going to do that anyway,” said Fon.

“I mean change into a disguise. Look like another kind of person. Preferably a productive. They are still safe.”